Archaeological news about the Archaeology of Early Medieval Europe from the Archaeology in Europe web site

Tuesday 12 March 2024

Dark Age Kings of Britain Confirmed by Archaeology


Early Dark Age Britain is notorious for being poorly recorded. Most of our information about the era comes from much later records, written centuries after the events they allegedly describe. There is endless debate from scholars, based on the literary evidence, surrounding the historicity of the kings of Britain of this era. However, there are a few cases where we do not need to rely on the later medieval records to know whether a given king really existed or not. There are about 200 stone inscriptions from Dark Age Britain. These inscriptions provide us with contemporary or near-contemporary insights into the kings of Britain at that time.

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Monday 4 March 2024

Magnet fisherman pulls a 1,200-year-old Viking sword out of a river

Trevor Penny found a Viking sword while magnet fishing in Oxfordshire
(Picture: Trevor Penny/Triangle News)

A magnet fisherman was shocked to learn a rusty sword he had pulled from a river was a 1,200-year-old Viking weapon.

Trevor Penny was using a powerful magnet to look for metal objects in the River Cherwell near Enslow in Oxfordshire when he made the fascinating find.

Excited, he notified his local finds liaison officer and gave the sword to experts to verify.

They have now dated the weapon to around 850 AD and say it would have once belonged to a Viking.

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Thursday 29 February 2024

7 Scientific Tools Archaeologists Use to Uncover the Viking World


Science loves the Vikings. NASA’s 1970s mission to Mars paid homage to the Vikings, and Bluetooth wireless technology takes its name from the Viking king of Denmark and Norway, Harald Bluetooth. The Bluetooth symbol on phones and computers also hails from Viking runes. Science has become essential to uncovering Viking archaeology, and new archaeological tools have allowed us to better understand the Viking world.

1. Strontium Isotope Analysis and Viking Archaeology

The Trelleborg Fortress located in Zealand, Denmark is a circular fortification divided into four quadrants. Inside each quadrant are longhouses. On its own, the fortress is an archaeological marvel, but the more archaeologists dig into the fortress, the more exceptional the monument proves to be.

King Harald Bluetooth organized defensive fortifications across the Viking world to maintain power during the 10th century. Excavations in Zealand from 1938-1940 revealed a fortification associated with Bluetooth’s reign and 157 buried individuals. But who were these people?

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Wednesday 28 February 2024

Kyivan Rus: The First East Slavic State


Long before Russia or Ukraine existed, there was Kyivan Rus.

Centuries before Russia or Ukraine raised arms against each other, Scandinavians made their way to Novgorod before moving on to Kyiv.

Kyivan Rus rose up during the 9th century and laid the foundations for the development of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus.

The city of Kyiv was the heart of Kyivan Rus, a loosely bound federation of principalities, each under the governance of its individual prince.

The state reached its pinnacle in the late 10th century when it adopted Christianity from Byzantium, marking the conversion of Kyivan Rus into Orthodox Christianity.

It also was a crucial hub for trade between the Baltic and Black Seas, helping foster growth and cultural exchange. This fusion of Slavic and Byzantine aesthetics in art, architecture, and political rule emerged. While it was taking in and absorbing influences around it, it was truly becoming a culture of its own. 

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Up to 50,000 coins from the 4th century discovered off of Sardinia


Archaeologists exploring the waters off the Italian island of Sardinia have discovered a cache of between 30,000 and 50,000 coins dating back to the first half of the 4th century.

The Italian Ministry of Culture announced the find, which were initially made by a diver swimming just off the north-eastern coast of Sardinia. They quickly reported the discovery to officials, including the Cultural Heritage Protection Unit of Sardinia, and a larger search was organized.

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Tuesday 27 February 2024

The Vinland Map: How a Mysterious Forgery Fooled Experts for Decades


The Vinland Map courted controversy from the moment its discovery was announced. / Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University // Public Domain (map); wilatlak villette/Moment/Getty Images (background)

In 1965, Pennsylvania Supreme Court justice Michael A. Musmanno traveled to Yale University to look at a map that, until recently, had been kept a closely guarded secret.

The document, dubbed the Vinland Map, was said to date back to 1440. It was inscribed with a phrase alternately deciphered as Vinlanda Insula, Vimlanda Insula, or Vinilanda Insula, and depicted a version of North America that included Greenland as an island as well as part of what appears to be the North American coast. When translated, text on the map seemed to corroborate the events of what are known as the Vinland Sagas, two 13th-century Icelandic texts that speak of legendary explorer Leif Erikson arriving in North America—likely present-day Newfoundland, Canada—by way of Greenland around 1000. If legit, as the university claimed it was, the map was the earliest representation of North America and provided more evidence that Vikings had made it to the continent nearly 500 years ahead of Christopher Columbus—who, although he sailed for Spain, was Genoese by birth and was later embraced by Italian Americans as a hero.

In a blow to their pride, the map’s existence was announced in a splashy press conference just before the holiday honoring the explorer. With it came a book written by scholars who had worked in secret for seven years to verify the map’s authenticity. “Cartographic Scholarship Turns Over New Leif,” the Los Angeles Times punned.

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Monday 26 February 2024

A 2,000-Year-Old Rune-Inscribed Knife Sheds Light on Denmark’s Past

The knife engraved with runes believed to be Denmark's oldest.
Photo: Rógvi N. Johansen, Museum Odense.

Archaeologists from the Museum Odense in Denmark recently unearthed a significant historical artifact: a small, 2,000-year-old knife bearing an exceptionally rare runic inscription.

The text, composed of five runes concluding with three depressions engraved into the knife, uses the oldest known runic alphabet. The runes represent the word “hirila,” interpreted to mean “Little Sword” in Old Norse. While it remains uncertain whether “hirila” refers to the knife itself or its owner, archaeologists affirm its status as a cherished possession interred in a grave almost two millennia ago. The relic was found under the remnants of an urn in a small burial ground east of Odense.

Speaking on the national significance of the discovery, museum inspector and archaeologist Jakob Bonde was thrilled. “It is a unique experience to stand with such an old and finished written language,” he said. “A runic inscription is like finding a message from ancient people.”

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